RAWALPINDI, June 28: The heavy rains in Sindh and the cyclone that lashed the coastal areas of Balochistan have been cited by the United Nations as “indications of what might happen more frequently and severely due to global warming.”

Commenting on rains and cyclone in Pakistan and the heatwave in Europe, United Nations International Strategy for Disaster Reduction (ISDR) Secretariat, Geneva, Director Salvana Birceno said: “We cannot wait to be taken by surprise, we know what is going to happen and we can prepare for it.”

“We are not trying to scare people but we want to alert every government of the urgency to put disaster risk reduction as a top priority of their political agenda as no country will be immune,” he added.

Steps that countries can take include devising early warning systems, building flood shelters, establishing contingency plans to evacuate people quickly and protecting homes and key buildings and infrastructures such as hospitals, schools, water supplies, electricity installations and transport systems.

According to UN relief agencies, the recent storms combined with tropical cyclone Yemyin, which made landfall on June 26 in Balochistan province, have caused significant damage in Pakistan, causing hundreds of deaths and bringing commercial activity in Karachi to a halt.

Reports by the UN Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) have warned of increased rainfalls and higher temperatures resulting from global warming.

“We can no longer afford to ignore growing and compelling warnings from the world’s leading experts,” Mr Briceqo said, adding that “the situation is not beyond remedy and building resilience and minimising costs, through adaptation to climate variability and change, is essential to secure the future of societies and economies.”

The ISDR secretariat, which is the United Nations body that advocates for disaster risk reduction policies, is urging governments to implement the “Hyogo Framework for Action”. The framework recommends a set of concrete measures and policies to reduce the impacts of disasters and increase the resilient of nations against natural hazards by 2015.

Adaptation to climate change means, for example, setting up early warning systems that can alert people on time, building flood shelters and having contingency plans in place to be able to evacuate hundreds of people rapidly, protecting houses and critical infrastructures such as hospitals, schools, water supplies, electricity installations and transport systems.

People in Pakistan and India were struggling to cope with the effects of the heavy rains over the past few days that have killed more than 200 people.

“Heatwaves, droughts, storms and floods have devastating consequences on people and their livelihoods today. Not only will climate change-related dangers worsen, according to the IPCC, our vulnerability to these is increasing, as more people settle in hazardous areas. It is a recipe for disaster.”

The IPCC has warned that people will need to adapt to face the impact of the warming that is already unavoidable, due to past greenhouse gas emissions. It called for more extensive adaptation to reduce vulnerability to future climate change.

The IPCC has identified the climate change impacts that will affect the various regions of the world, sectors of the world economy and systems.

The hardest hit include the Artic, sub Saharan Africa, small islands, developing states, and Asian mega-deltas, as well as coastal zones, water resources and human health. And it is the poorest who will suffer the most as they have the least means to adapt.

The report foresees more urban flooding, landslides, heatwaves and drought, which will affect the economies of many human settlements.

By 2030, two-thirds of humanity will live in cities and more than two billion people will live in slums, according to UN Habitat.